


Lying Old Dogs

by MalcolmInSpace



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Chakwas saying bottle, F/M, Little Black Dress, Mass Effect 3, Serrice ice brandy, The Reaper War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-17
Updated: 2016-03-17
Packaged: 2018-05-27 05:52:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,141
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6272404
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MalcolmInSpace/pseuds/MalcolmInSpace
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Zaeed and Chakwas in a quiet moment before the end of all things.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lying Old Dogs

**Author's Note:**

  * For [honeybee592](https://archiveofourown.org/users/honeybee592/gifts).



_ The Citadel, Karin Chakwas’s apartment, 0230 hours Citadel standard time.   _ _ One week before the final attack on the Cerberus base. _

“This,” Zaeed said with some feeling, “is a goddamn good collection.” He was standing in front of the wet bar, partially silhouetted by the light coming through the big bay windows overlooking the Presidium lake.

“I believe you are repeating yourself,” Chakwas said with a wry archness. Ice tinkled as she sipped from her glass.  She was wearing a long, slinky, slit black gown that shimmered like fish scales. The lights were turned down low and the apartment was cool shadows and warm furniture.  They had been dancing.

“Just showing the proper goddamn appreciation, Karin.” He turned to her and took in the sight of her, from her bare feet to her elegant hair.  “You know how much I enjoy that.”

Chakwas did know indeed, and she hid another smile behind her glass. Standing there, his face enough in shadow to hide his dead eye, shirt hanging off broad shoulders with his tie pulled askew he might have been a high society type, one of the human noveau riche they’d rubbed elbows with as they danced.

She rose with a whisper of silk and crossed to him. She placed a hand there on the scar across his cheek and looked at him. A good man, hard and hardened, with fire and blood behind and before him.  He took her hand and held it gently for a moment. “Let's not get maudlin tonight,” he growled, and kissed her knuckles, then took her glass and turned back to the bar. “Let's see what else you’ve got back here.”

Chakwas turned to look out the window and hugged her arms across her chest.  The Presidium was in night-cycle, the lights lowered and tuned slightly violet to blend with the glow of the nebula outside.  It was beautiful.  From up here, the scars from the fighting during the coup were invisible and Chakwas could imagine the Presidium was the same peaceful, graceful curve it had been when she’d first seen it.  The distant susurrus of voices and movement and traffic filtered softly through the security screen, and near at hand the tinkle of laughter as a young couple dangled their feet into the lake.  Once upon a time they might have been herded away by a Keeper or a C-Sec officer, but now their minor trespass was so unimportant as to go unremarked.  They were just stealing a few moments of intimacy before the war found them, she thought.  She had no way of knowing that it would find them and everyone else on The Citadel in horrifying and very final fashion in just a few short days, while humanity's hero fought humanity's monsters around the corpse of a miscarried god.

Glass and plastic chinked and shifted as Zaeed shuffled through Chakwas’s collection.  He whistled softly and pulled out a bottle. “Serrice ice… huh.  Never figured you for the type to keep empty bottles around.”

Chakwas turned back from the window and smiled softly.  “That one’s special.  A gift from Shepard.  For remembering old friends.”

Zaeed peered down the neck of the bottle. “Good stuff for remembering.  Too expensive to use for forgetting.”  He put the bottle back and poured from another.  By the time he turned back, Chakwas had moved to the sofa and was sitting with one foot tucked under her, her dress carelessly hiked up far enough that the lace top of a stocking was peeking out. He looked, and smiled. She turned and saw him looking and smiled back. She extended one hand with exaggerated languor and pulled him down next to her. He handed her a drink and they clinked and sipped and held hands.

There was a long, comfortable quiet before she reached over and with the same easy assurance she used to pull shrapnel out, untied his tie and dropped it on the floor. “There,” she said, “that's better.  You’re simply not the tie sort.”

“I thought I looked good in that.”

“Oh, you do. Believe me. But being good at something isn't the same as being defined by it.”

Zaeed growled. “I am too old, too drunk, and having far too good a night to get into that philosophical shit.” Chakwas laughed, low and throaty, and he chuckled to hear it. “I spent my life being defined by what I’m goddamn good at, and I’m not going to stop now. Old dogs and all that.” Chakwas feigned a bow of her head, ceding the point.

“You may be an old dog, but at least you're not a lying one.”

“Lying, no, but I think I'll soon be a sleeping one.”  He took another mouthful of his drink and grimaced.  “Shit. That got goddamn depressing. Sorry, Karin.”

Chakwas waved a hand in dismissal.  “It's in the air these days, even here. I had hoped a day off the  _ Normandy _ would give me a break, but Udina put paid to that.”

Zaeed just grunted, and Chakwas realized he was likely reliving the kidnapping of Vorlack. “How is she,” Zaeed asked abruptly. “Shepard, I mean.”

“Is there any other ‘she’ right now?” Chakwas shrugged and sipped her own drink. “The same. Worse. It's hard to tell. I fix the wounds I can, but I think she is bearing wounds we can't even see. Earth. Thessia. What happened on Rannoch, which she still won't properly talk to me about.  Hackett says- what? What's that face for? Do you know the admiral?”

“Biblically, but that's a story for never. What's the old bastard say?”

“He called Shepard the tip of his spear, and she is-”

“When she's not being a goddamn battering ram.”

“Quite. But she's being ground down, and she's running out of friends.” She paused, took a swallow, and gave him a firm look. “She could always use another.”

Zaeed tensed. “After that mess during the coup I'm not sure she'd want me around.  Besides, I've got other work. Maybe in a few weeks…”

Chakwas placed a hand on his shoulder and squeezed. “You’re a mean, unpleasant old dog, but I rather think she likes having you around.”

“Is that so.”

“Of course. You’re probably the closest she's got to a krogan these days, and the Normandy’s just not the same without  _ someone _ suggesting excessive violence at every turn.”  They laughed together, and then she stood. “I've changed my mind. You are a lying dog and as such I shall let you sleep.”

“Is that so,” he repeated.

“Yes.” Her dress slithered to the floor with a whisper of silk, and Zaeed rose. “With me.”  She took his hand and pulled him to his feet and then towards her bedroom. They would steal a few moments of intimacy before the war found them. 

They would never see each other again.


End file.
